It is debilitating to feel powerless. It is dangerous, too. But that is the state of mind of many Britons as they approach the first anniversary of the horrific attacks in London on 7 July 2005. The arbitrary nature of terrorism has that effect.
The state's response to the bombings was, on one level, reassuring. The presence of uniformed police on buses and Tubes straight afterwards showed that something was being done, even if nobody quite knew what that something was. Two weeks after the first bombings, perhaps even greater carnage was averted. And then: emergency measures were introduced, various raids were conducted across the country, but life returned to "normal".
The raid at Forest Gate a month ago shattered that calm. Yet though it gave rise to fear and recrimination, some good was done - the public was given a reality check and reminded of the need for vigilance and caution. But to what end? The underlying problem in any individual response to the terrorist threat is that nobody knows what to think and whom to believe. Was Forest Gate a botched job? Were the police and intelligence services on to something, but just a tad slow? Were they given maliciously wrong information in order to inflame community relations? Are our security services simply not up to the job?
The security services' own assessment of the situation is alarming. They claim to have identified several thousand potential "terrorists" in the UK. They then double the number to take into account those they are not aware of. Some 20 ongoing "plots" are in active preparation, they say. One reaction might be: they would say that, wouldn't they? After all, MI5 has managed to double its budget and its staffing levels since 9/11; and which institution enjoys downsizing?
What matters more than their motives, however, is the ability of law-enforcement agencies to forestall another attack. The spooks themselves are frank about that. They insist that no matter how hard they work, the most skilful terrorist cells are several steps ahead of them. They know the intelligence is patchy and, by its nature, incomplete.
They insist that they would rather make further mistakes and be accused of excessive zeal - and risk further radicalising parts of the Muslim community - than regret, after a future bomb, not having acted on what scraps of intelligence they had. They must also hope that evidence that may be brought to court in a series of forthcoming terrorist trials could vindicate their approach.
Ultimately, it comes down to trust, and there lies the rub. There is deep resentment in parts of the security services over "Iraq and the dossier", as they call it. By exaggerating the threat posed by Saddam Hussein, the Prime Minister and his team misrepresented the nature and scope of intelligence and, the agencies say, have made it almost impossible to issue credible assessments of home-grown terrorism. Police and security chiefs also have an unromantic view about the consequences of government foreign policy. Privately, they have no compunction about linking Tony Blair's approach to warfare abroad with safety on the streets at home.
Putting cause and effect to one side, what matters most is to restore public confidence. Two changes must be made. The Commons cross-party intelligence and security committee, which was to issue its annual report on 29 June, should be reformed and given more powers. These should include being able to call upon lay experts among the senior MPs and peers, as well as being able to summon ministers, civil servants and security chiefs. It should also be given the task of compiling and issuing regular terrorism assessments to the public, taking the job away from the government.
In addition, a full public inquiry must be held into the circumstances surrounding the London bombings of 2005 - particularly the intelligence failings in the preceding weeks. Some information will have to remain secret, for fear of prejudicing trials and jeopardising operations, but the exercise still is vital. After all, if the situation is as bad as the security services and police say it is, they need all the help from the public they can get.
History matters: pass it on
Human beings are clever. We can squash a camera, a phone, a hi-fi and a PC into a box the size of a cigarette packet. We can poke the surface of Mars and measure the spin on an electron. Better still, we can cultivate asparagus, distil malt whisky and sun-dry tomatoes. But - and it should be simple by comparison - can we learn from our past? You need not look far for an answer. From terrorism and the Middle East to prisons and sex scandals, we seem trapped in a cycle of repeated mistakes, a Groundhog Day without the learning curve. So when the National Trust, English Heritage and other such bodies join forces, as they do on 2 July, to launch a campaign with the slogan "History matters - pass it on", are they wasting their breath?
Their concern, it should be said, is with the present, with heritage as part of the modern environment, and with the future, and the need to ensure that we continue preserving that heritage. With that in view, they are right to remind us that churches and castles, paintings and documents, museums and memories are precious and expensive to maintain. Beyond that, however, the slogan reminds us that at least we should want to learn from our past, and that if we fail to cultivate historical knowledge we are worse than idiots: we are ignorant idiots. Without knowledge we can certainly never learn, and so have no chance of escaping recurring error. Without the past, in other words, we have no hope. So yes, history matters, and yes, do pass it on.
